Vanilla
Vanilla is a lightweight and extensible free/open source forum application developed by Mark O’Sullivan using the PHP scripting language and MySQL database management system.
History
Vanilla grew from the software used by Mark O’Sullivan to run a private forum called “o8″. When the private forum was shut down, users petitioned O’Sullivan to release the software publicly.
The first version of Vanilla was identical to the old “o8″ forum software, but was quickly redesigned for simplicity and the ability to integrate extensions. O’Sullivan released the 0.9 version of Vanilla on July 16, 2005. The software came out of beta as Vanilla 1 on July 1, 2006.
Features
Vanilla is a W3C standards compliant application with valid XHTML and CSS. Vanilla 1 includes a new templating system which allows Vanilla to be easily integrated into an existing site layout. Vanilla 1 also has the ability to easily integrate with existing systems so users only need to sign in at one place for both Vanilla and an existing application.
Vanilla’s includes a framework, upon which it is built: the Lussumo Framework. This framework allows developers to create and add new extensions to the core software. The basic installation of Vanilla comes with very few features, but there is an add-on site at http:lussumo.com/addons where you can get all of the latest new extensions.
Here are some of the most popular extensions for Vanilla:
RSS and Atom feedsWhispers, for private conversations.Intelligent search and search bookmarking system, for users to bookmark their most used searches.Search-engine friendly URLsForum announcementsAnimations using JavaScript